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Value-based branch prediction: an alternative approach to branch prediction

Martina Fogliato

Value-based branch prediction: an alternative approach to branch prediction.

Rel. Claudio Passerone. Politecnico di Torino, Corso di laurea magistrale in Ingegneria Elettronica (Electronic Engineering), 2019

Abstract:

One of the major performance obstacles for modern microprocessor architectures focused on increasing Instruction Level Parallelism are control dependencies. In particular, in all those processors characterized by a deep pipeline and a large issue width, the pressure is on the ability of branch predictors to fetch a large number of instructions from the correct execution path. An accurate predictor can reduce control dependencies and provide a smooth flow of execution. However, some branches are not easily predicted by traditional dynamic prediction techniques, which construct a history of the previous branch outcomes. Value-based branch prediction tries to correlate these hard-to-predict branches with any other architectural or execution information, in order to improve the prediction accuracy. The purpose of this work is to analyze some value-based branch predictors presented in the scientific literature and evaluate their accuracy and performance. The report is organized as follows: the first chapter introduces control hazards and value-based prediction through the literature. The second and the third chapters focus on the software implementation of the chosen predictor, first statically - through statistics - then dynamically - modifying the execution flow. The RTL implementation is addressed in the fourth chapter, while the fifth one contains some final remarks and propositions for further work.

Relatori: Claudio Passerone
Anno accademico: 2018/19
Tipo di pubblicazione: Elettronica
Numero di pagine: 92
Informazioni aggiuntive: Tesi secretata. Fulltext non presente
Soggetti:
Corso di laurea: Corso di laurea magistrale in Ingegneria Elettronica (Electronic Engineering)
Classe di laurea: Nuovo ordinamento > Laurea magistrale > LM-29 - INGEGNERIA ELETTRONICA
Ente in cotutela: EURECOM - Telecom Paris Tech (FRANCIA)
Aziende collaboratrici: NON SPECIFICATO
URI: http://webthesis.biblio.polito.it/id/eprint/10999
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